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Starting today to coincide with its annual QuakeCon event in Dallas, TX, Bethesda is holding a massive Steam sale on its entire catalog of published titles. That includes the entire DOOM franchise, Fallout titles, The Elder Scrolls games, and more. That means massive discounts on some of the biggest and best PC games ever made — including three of the highest profile VR titles to date: Skyrim VR, Fallout 4 VR, and DOOM VFR.

During the sale all three of the aforementioned titles will have 30% discounts. That’s not as much as some of Bethesda’s non-VR counterparts, but given the recency of their launches it’s still notable. If you’ve been holding off on any of these three titles, now is a good time to dive in.

Skyrim VR (Steam page) is easily the best of the bunch. Since it has robust unofficial mod support you can easily install some amazing mods to up your immersion and truly transform the game. Fallout 4 VR (Steam page) is a solid choice as well if gritty sci-fi is more your style and DOOM VFR (Steam page), while not as deep and engaging as the 2016 DOOM reboot, features a solid amount of thrills in its abbreviated campaign if you like blood and gore.

Worth noting is that DOOM 3 BFG Edition also has unofficial VR support by way of a fan mod and that game is currently $7.99. You can even play the original DOOM for just a couple bucks as well in VR.

During an E3 interview, Bethesda’s senior vice president of global marketing and communications, Pete Hines, told us that all three titles (Skyrim VR, Fallout 4 VR, and DOOM VFR) have sold well and that there are keeping VR on their radar as a case-by-case platform. Now Wolfenstein and Prey are both coming to VR devices soon, as well as The Elder Scrolls: Blades, so the publisher is far from withdrawing support.

Are you looking to pick up any of these cheap Bethesda titles? Let us know down in the comments below!

Lufthansa partners with 3Spin to deliver a unique VR experience featuring 3D maps of mountain tops, lakes, and cities, all in real-time. ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, please buckle up your seatbelts, move your seats and trays in the upright position, put on your VR headsets and prepare for takeoff.’ Those are the words that Lufthansa airlines

Lemnis Technologies wants to beat Oculus to the punch with varifocal VR technology.

The company today announced that it will launch a new software and hardware platform simply named Verifocal at SIGGRAPH 2018 in Vancouver next week. The platform uses two eye-tracking cameras integrated into a headset to adjust the focus of where you’re looking in VR in real-time, creating a clearer image.

Varifocal technology has a lot of potential benefits for VR, though Lemnis says its solution is designed to combat eye-strain and reduce sickness inside VR as a result. The platform can even accommodate prescriptions, meaning users can take off their glasses inside a headset.

It doesn’t sound like this solution will actually adjust the distance of a VR display from your eyes based on where you’re looking, though we’ve reached out to Lemnis to clarify. That’s what happens in Oculus’ recently revealed Half-Dome prototype, which is the result of years of R&D work from the Facebook Reality Labs team. Still, we have no idea when we’ll see those features in a consumer Oculus headset, whereas Lemnis’ solution sounds like it could be closer to home.

At SIGGRAPH, Verifocal will be shown running in a headset based off of Microsoft’s Windows ‘Mixed Reality’ VR headsets. Attendees will be able to order an evaluation kit during the show. As for when and where we’ll see the tech integrated into a consumer device, that’s still up in the air.

WorldViz’s professional VR development platform is getting an upgrade today.

The latest version of the company’s Python-based service, Vizard 6, is now available. Vizard isn’t a game development engine like Unreal or Unity but instead a scientific-grade platform designed to create VR applications with a range of headsets and peripherals such as eye-tracking cameras or hand-tracking gloves. Rather than making a game, say, it might instead be used by universities to build research projects that use different tracking systems. You can check out some of the new features in the trailer below.

In its latest update, Vizard adds support for Microsoft’s Windows ‘Mixed Reality’ VR headsets as well as the Manus VR Gloves and Tobii eye-tracking hardware. The platform will allow you to pair these new devices with preset options that should get you up and running as soon as possible. Elsewhere, support for the GLTF 3D model format, which opens up more models from the likes of Blender, Modo and over 150,000 models from Sketchfab.

Finally, the platform now recognizes avatars created in Adobe Fuse CC.

WorldViz will be showcasing Vizard at SIGGRAPH 2018 in Vancouver next week.

A smattering of news outlets including Wired, CNBC, The Verge, Wall Street Journal and MIT’s Technology Review were granted Magic Leap One demos in connection with the availability of pre-orders today.

I found the piece by Rachel Metz at the MIT Technology Review to be the most enlightening of the articles written about Magic Leap One’s launch, with Metz writing that Magic Leap still won’t offer a clear description of how its technology operates.

“It’s shining light through see-through wafers built into the headset’s lenses, and those wafers direct the light toward your eyes,” Metz wrote. “Users should be able to see 3-D images clearly all the way from up close—the virtual light field starts 14.6 inches from your face—to out in the distance.”

Here’s more of what Metz had to say along with some quotable sections from the other hands-on reports today:

MIT Technology Review: “The visuals were crisp and vivid, and in some cases I was able to see several digital images, positioned at various depths, at the same time….I think ML One is likely the best AR headset out there right now…It is tinted, so donning it is kind of like wearing sunglasses indoors…while the experiences in the demo room are fun and visually impressive, none of it is truly mind-blowing…the hardware will have to get still smaller and better.”

The Verge: “The Magic Leap One’s 50-degree diagonal field of view, while larger than the competing Microsoft HoloLens, is still extremely limited. And the image quality feels roughly on par with the two-year-old HoloLens. It’s generally good, but with some tracking and transparency issues.”

Wired: “As I stand in front of Abovitz’s desk, watching the dinosaur stretch his neck, a man walks behind the cartoon character and he is completely obscured…I tried out the Magic Leap One in a 1,000-square-foot faux-living room that had been tricked out in West Elm furniture, and it wasn’t great at first.” The writer reported some trouble with the fitting. When it was fixed, the writer described experiences “certainly on par with other augmented reality and virtual reality demos I have seen. Are they really mind-blowingly better than the competition? Not yet.”

CNBC: “Might Leap’s lightfield technology wasn’t convincing enough that I actually thought there were objects in front of me but it did do a good job putting 3D rendered objects into the real world.”

Wall Street Journal: “Cameras and other sensors in the headset scan surrounding objects and surfaces—from your arms to the chair’s armrest. When I placed a virtual orange fish between two actual couch pillows, it swam back and forth between them. Some objects appeared cut off unless I turned my head or took a few steps back. Mr. Abovitz says this will be improved in Magic Leap Two.”

CNET: “Magic Leap One suffers from a limited field of view, according to my colleague Scott Stein. That means what you see through the headset isn’t as large as the space you’re in. Abovitz says to think of the viewing window as a cone that widens as it moves

Today’s launch of the Magic Leap One Creator Edition may seem like it’s all about the hardware, but you’ll need stuff to actually play and watch on your new headset too. Fortunately, the company has that covered.

Alongside the launch of the $2,295 AR headset today, Magic Leap revealed the first five experiences that customers will get to try out. They include everything from games to experiential pieces and social applications.

Tonandi

Tonandi is a musical experience created in collaboration with Sigur Rós. It’s an audio-visual experience in which fantastical sights and sounds surround you as music unravels. The Tonandi themselves are little creatures you can interact with.

Project Create

Doing what it says on the tin, Project Create is a virtual playground for you to build in. It sounds like Magic Leap’s version of Tilt Brush, allowing users to paint with 3D brush strokes but also design other items and objects using blocks and more. Based on the video above, that’s even some interactive elements involved.

Invaders

This looks like the true ‘game’ of the bunch. Invaders is a first-person shooter in which you fend off evil robots that appear through the walls and floor. The remote-like controller is your weapon that you must use to defend your home. No gameplay of this one yet, sadly, but it does feature the voice talents of Stephen Fry and Rhys Darby

Social

Another straightforward name. Social allows you to build your own avatar and then follows friends with the aim of soon bringing everyone together to hangout. A Cast feature will let people see in the same room, while Avatar Chat (coming this fall) will use eye and hand-tracking to bring virtual humans into your living room. Again, no footage right now.

Helio

Finally, Helio is an intriguing feature that lets you summon 3D objects and place them around you, straight from the web. Showcasing Magic Leap’s potential for retail, the company has already partnered with Wayfair and The New York Times as samples of this. You might bring a piece of furniture into your home to see how it fits, for example, while NYT looks to ‘redefine the art of storytelling’.

Developers can now buy Magic Leap One Creator Edition for $2,295 (provided you’re a developer and live in the right US city). But what are you actually getting for that money?

Alongside the launch of the AR headset today, the Florida-based company finally gave a full rundown of its tech specs. It’s important to remember that Magic Leap is made up of three main components: the headset, named Lightwear, a controller and a companion device that powers it all named Lightpack.

Power
Built-in rechargeable lithium-ion battery. Up to 3 hours continuous use. Battery life can vary based on use cases. Power level will be sustained when connected to an AC outlet. 45-watt USB-C Power Delivery (PD) charger

Nearly four years after it was first teased to the world, the first Magic Leap augmented reality headset is now on sale to developers.

Magic Leap One, as the device is called, can be purchased through the company’s website as a Creator Edition for $2,295. Not only must you have have a US Zip Code to purchase one, but you need to be living in a handful of selected cities for this initial roll out.

The developer kit consists of a headset that resembles a pair of goggles. Similar to Microsoft’s $3,000 HoloLens, the device can project virtual images into the real world that you can interact with using a remote-like controller (though HoloLens uses gesture controls). A range of sensors fitted to the headset can track your location in a room, allowing you to move around with virtual images staying in place. A small companion device named the Lightpack is worn by the users at all times and powers the headset with Nvidia’s Tegra X2 mobile chip.

Developers have had access to Magic Leap’s software development kit (SDK) since it launched at GDC back in March. The device will support apps made on both Unity and Unreal game development engines. Recent leaks suggest the kit has a 40-degree horizontal field of view (FOV), which is slightly bigger than HoloLen’s 30-degree FOV.

It’s been a long road to the launch of hardware for Magic Leap, which has raised around $2.3 billion in funding since 2014 from the likes of Google and many more. The sheer scale of investment paired with the years of secrecy has created lofty expectations for the Florida-based company. Hopefully, as kits start shipping out to developers, we’ll find out if it’s really delivered.

As for a consumer launch, the company isn’t ready to talk about that just yet, but we do know that AT&T will be the exclusive carrier for the device in the US.

A few weeks ago we reported that ship-battling PSVR exclusive, Bow to Blood, would be releasing at the end of August. At the time we didn’t have any new footage to show, but now we do.

The launch trailer for Tribetoy’s VR debut is here and it promises a vibrant VR experience. It gives us a good look at the game’s tournament-style matches, in which you command a flying ship in races and battles, ordering a crew around and occasionally taking up arms yourself. A virtual audience will vote on your performance, determining your position in the tournament.

It looks pretty promising, though Bow to Blood is going to have its work cut out for it come launch day. The game’s arriving on August 28th, which is the same day as the much-anticipated Firewall: Zero Hour and Torn. Let’s hope Tribetoy’s game is strong enough to stand out.